Lund Ho!

Tonight the second series of The Killing (aka Forbrydelsen) will kick-off on BBC4, with the first two episodes airing from 9pm onwards. Hurrah! Set two years after the events of the previous series, and consisting of just ten episodes, S02 sees the brilliant-but-demoted detective Sarah Lund (Sofie Gråbøl) being called in to consult on another complicated murder case with political ramifications, by her former boss, the super-tall-and-scary Lennart Brix. And that’s all I want/need to know for now, frankly.

After raving about the iconic power of Lund’s knitwear in my previous post, I was going to avoid the subject entirely here… but the fact is that it seems to have dominated all of Gråbøl’s promotional interviews for the “new” series (which the lucky Danes got to see back in 2009). Apparently it’s the first thing anyone ever asks her about when they meet her on the street, which must get quite frustrating for the actress, but I think it’s fairly understandable… I mean, it’s a safer ice-breaker than asking her about rape and murder, right? Apparently Gråbøl made a concerted effort to stop the jumper upstaging her this time around, by wearing a plain red alternate in the first few episodes, but eventually she began to miss her old woollen ally. According to an interview in this week’s Radio Times:

“You know, I love that sweater and yet I hate it. It’s so strong that it’s almost wearing me. So we had a meeting and I said, ‘I’m not going to give it to them.’ But then after three or four episodes, I had another meeting and decided, ‘OK, I have to get the old sweater back.’ I tried to escape it but found that I just couldn’t.”

Sadly, she also revealed that the third series, to be broadcast in Denmark next autumn, will also be the last… although she did joke that she might revive the character in the future: “She could end up like Miss Marple!” Yes, please!

Oh, and Gråbøl also has a cameo in one of the forthcoming Absolutely Fabulous specials (presumably as herself, rather than Lund), so there’s that to look forward to, too!

[Note: The Radio Times “interview” was based on a Q&A session with Gråbøl and senior producer Piv Bernth, which followed a recent screening of the first episode, hosted by BAFTA and the Danish Embassy. For a full transcript, check out this blog]